But the Greeks will say that these accounts are
fabulous, although two whole nations are witnesses to their
truth. But why may we not consider the accounts of the Greeks as
fabulous rather than those? Perhaps some one, however, wishing
not to appear blindly to accept his own statements and reject those of
others, would conclude, after a close examination of the matter, that
the wonders mentioned by the Greeks were performed by certain demons;
those among the Jews by prophets or by angels, or by God through the
means of angels; and those recorded by Christians by Jesus Himself, or
by His power working in His apostles. Let us, then, compare all
these accounts together; let us examine into the aim and purpose of
those who performed them; and let us inquire what effect was produced
upon the persons on whose account these acts of kindness were
performed, whether beneficial or hurtful, or neither the one nor the
other. The ancient Jewish people, before they sinned against God,
and were for their great wickedness cast off by Him, must evidently
have been a people of great wisdom.
49404940φιλόσοφον. But
Christians, who have in so wonderful a manner formed themselves into a
community, appear at first to have been more induced by miracles than
by exhortations to forsake the institutions of their fathers, and to
adopt others which were quite strange to them. And indeed, if we
were to reason from what is probable as to the first formation of the
Christian society, we should say that it is incredible that the
apostles of Jesus Christ, who were unlettered men of humble life, could
have been emboldened to preach Christian truth to men by anything else
than the power which was conferred upon them, and the grace which
accompanied their words and rendered them effective; and those who
heard them would not have renounced the old-established usages of their
fathers, and been induced to adopt notions so different from those in
which they had been brought up, unless they had been moved by some
extraordinary power, and by the force of miraculous
events.